I arrived in Nagoya, Japan for teacher training at AEON (one of the "Big 4" English Conversation School companies in Japan) on January 7, 1995, 10 days before the Great Hanshin Earthquake (阪神大震災). It seems so long ago, but I remember that week of training pretty vividly, especially a couple of nights eating out at a little Yakitori (grilled chicken bits on sticks) dive that was under the railroad tracks at Tsurumai Station. That was really my first "wow" experience in Japan.
I moved from Nagoya up to Takaoka, along the sea of Japan coast, a week later and it turned out that the big Kobe earthquake happened the morning of my first day of work. We shook in Toyama, but as it was my first earthquake I had nothing to judge against in terms of deciding whether it was a nearby quake, a small or big one, or an aftershock of something that had happened before I arrived. It was pretty shocking to wake up the next morning and see scenes of Kobe on fire (of course, I couldn't read or understand Japanese, so watching TV the fires could have been right outside my window for all I knew...!)
In any event, this photo was taken months later at a party we had at my colleague and friend Susan's (2nd from right) apartment. My students Hiroki (1st on L), Fumi (3rd on L), and Kaoru (1st on R), and Fumi's younger sister Junko (2nd from L in Kimono) were there, as was my friend Dan, who took the picture. Junko had been to have a formal picture taken prior to her "coming of age ceremony" (成人式), which was to be held the following January, hence the Kimono.
Hiroki got married in 1997, or so, and now has two children. Fumi got married in 2005 and she and her husband have recently moved into a new house in Toyama. Susan got married in 2004, I think I heard from Dan (who got married in 2004 as well, if memory serves, and now has a son). While I have no idea what happened to Kaoru, I do know that Junko got married and moved to Tokyo and recently nearly died due to an illness.
Looking at that photo, you'd never know it about any of us, of course.
Next time, a memory of 1996, the year I turned 25.
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